Paola Lapalma

Paola Lapalma is an ELT professional, teacher trainer, and academic director with
over 20 years of classroom and institutional experience. She is the founder and
director of English for Life Institute in Maldonado, Uruguay, an official Anglia ESOL
examination centre, where she designs and delivers teacher training programmes
focused on process-based writing, learner autonomy, and communicative
approaches for young learners and adults. She is also the organizer of
InnovateELT, a conference for teachers of English held in Maldonado and declared
an event of city interest by Junta Departamental de Maldonado.
Paola holds a Level 5 TEFL Certificate and a Teaching Business English
Certificate from The TEFL Academy UK. She has completed Delta Module 1 from
Cambridge and holds the Cambridge Train the Trainer certification. She has
earned the full TKT series (Modules 1, 2, 3, CLIL, KAL, and Practical), the national
Teacher Training Course (TTC) from Greenwich Institute, and is a trained
Speaking Assessor for Anglia Examinations, UK.
She trains teachers to move beyond product-focused instruction toward
frameworks that develop genuine thinking, creativity, and writing confidence in
young learners. Her sessions are grounded in process writing theory and designed
to be immediately applicable across diverse classroom contexts.
Paola is committed to bringing Latin American classroom perspectives and the
importance of cultural identity and global citizenship to the classroom.